Gypsy Witch

Fortune Telling Playing Cards

US Playing Card Co.

Originally
designed in just after the turn of the century, this deck makes a good,
accessible deck for the common people who want to tell their fortunes on
the coffee table over tea. It's certainly easier than reading tea leaves,
and that's part of its enduring popularity. Based, it says, on the divination
system of the Madame Lenormand, mystic to the wealthy and powerful of 19th
century Europe, this deck has the symbolic meanings of the cards written
right on their faces. The entire system fits neatly in the little leaflet
that accompanies the deck. The system isn't trivial, but in conjunction
with card meanings that don't have to be looked up, a novice can sit down
and make a reading in just a few minutes, with no awkward pauses soent
flipping through a book. And with time and practice, any reader can be
come positively facile with the provided tableaux, and be able to move
on to more complex and specific techniques. The introduction reads:

Mlle. Le Normand, the celebrated French Mystic, has left
such an imprint upon history that any more than a cursory reference here
would be superfluous. It suffices only to say that it was Mlle. Le Normand
who predicted to the great Napoleon his phenomenal rise and sudden fall.
Mlle. Le Normand was one of the greatest of living prophets and was so
recognized by the nobility of Europe.

In order that her wonderful system of divining the past, present,
and future by means of cards may be preserved and utilized, we have reproduced
it in our language and have so arranged the game that any person can lay
the cards in proper position and proceed with the reading. Two complete
methods are described: one for a short reading and one for a longer detailed
reading.

This is certainly among the best-known fortune-telling deck in the U.S.,
aside from such Tarot decks as the Rider. It has been in continuous publication
since its introduction in 1904, and remains to this day essentially unchanged.
The Encyclopedia of American Playing Cards says of it:

"Gypsy Witch celebrated FORTUNE TELLING cards by Madame Lenormand,
copyrighted 1903 by Frederick J. Drake Co., first published by Home Game
Co., in 1904. This deck has been published continuously and is currently
being made by U. S. Playing Card Co., using the same faces. The recent
edition has a witch on the backs replacing the original river scene."

As with every other fortune telling deck, each card has a specific symbolic
meaning, which becomes significant in the context of its position in the
layout. The cards all contain original, standard faces, reduced so that
the meanings and illustrations can occupy the remaining space. There is
little, if any, correspondence between the meanings of these cards and
the other systems I have, which is strange, given the parallels I've found
in all the others. But this just means that the tradition for this deck
diverged from the others long ago. It bears a fair resemblance to the other
"Gypsy" systems I know of.